Former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro on Saturday underwent a medical procedure to treat recurrent hiccups he has been dealing with for months, his medical team said.
The 70-year-old former Brazilian president, who is serving a 27-year prison sentence for an attempted coup, had been released from prison on Wednesday last week to undergo surgery for a groin hernia at the DF Star Hospital in Brasilia.
That surgery was performed on Thursday without incident, and Bolsonaro remained hospitalized for several days for evaluation.
Photo: AFP
During that time, Bolsonaro’s medical team determined it was necessary to perform an anesthetic block of the phrenic nerve — which controls the diaphragm — to treat his recurring hiccups.
Bolsonaro’s doctor, Claudio Birolini, told reporters on Thursday that the procedure involved locating the nerve using an ultrasound machine and then injecting it with a local analgesic.
The procedure on Saturday “went well,” said Mateus Saldanha, another of the doctors.
Birolini said the process took about an hour, adding that “it’s not surgery... It does not involve any incisions.”
The right side of the nerve was treated on Saturday, and a procedure to treat the left side of the nerve is set for today.
“My love just went to the surgical center to have his phrenic nerve blocked,” former Brazilian first lady Michelle Bolsonaro wrote in an Instagram post on Saturday.
“It’s been nine months of struggle and anguish with daily hiccups,” she added.
The far-right former president, who was in power from 2019 to 2022, has for years been dealing with the aftermath of an abdominal stab wound he sustained during a 2018 campaign rally, requiring several major surgeries.
In September, Brazilian Supreme Court found Bolsonaro guilty of conspiring to stay in power after losing the 2022 election to Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, and handed him a 27-year prison sentence.
The coup failed due to a lack of support from the top military brass. The far-right ex-president has claimed his innocence, claiming he was being persecuted by the Supreme Court.
Bolsonaro was under house arrest from August until his imprisonment on Nov. 22.
Once discharged from the hospital, Bolsonaro would return to serving his sentence at a federal police jail in the capital.
The Supreme Court on Saturday also ordered house arrest for 10 officials from Bolsonaro’s administration who were involved in planning the coup plot, sought legal justification for it, or spread disinformation about it on social media. The 10 officials had been convicted, but were out of prison due to pending appeals. One of the officials, Silvinei Vasques, was detained on Friday in Paraguay after he allegedly tried to board a flight with false papers.
The death of a former head of China’s one-child policy has been met not by tributes, but by castigation of the abandoned policy on social media this week. State media praised Peng Peiyun (彭珮雲), former head of China’s National Family Planning Commission from 1988 to 1998, as “an outstanding leader” in her work related to women and children. The reaction on Chinese social media to Peng’s death in Beijing on Sunday, just shy of her 96th birthday, was less positive. “Those children who were lost, naked, are waiting for you over there” in the afterlife, one person posted on China’s Sina Weibo platform. China’s
‘NO COUNTRY BUMPKIN’: The judge rejected arguments that former prime minister Najib Razak was an unwitting victim, saying Najib took steps to protect his position Imprisoned former Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak was yesterday convicted, following a corruption trial tied to multibillion-dollar looting of the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) state investment fund. The nation’s high court found Najib, 72, guilty on four counts of abuse of power and 21 charges of money laundering related to more than US$700 million channeled into his personal bank accounts from the 1MDB fund. Najib denied any wrongdoing, and maintained the funds were a political donation from Saudi Arabia and that he had been misled by rogue financiers led by businessman Low Taek Jho. Low, thought to be the scandal’s mastermind, remains
‘POLITICAL LOYALTY’: The move breaks with decades of precedent among US administrations, which have tended to leave career ambassadors in their posts US President Donald Trump’s administration has ordered dozens of US ambassadors to step down, people familiar with the matter said, a precedent-breaking recall that would leave embassies abroad without US Senate-confirmed leadership. The envoys, career diplomats who were almost all named to their jobs under former US president Joe Biden, were told over the phone in the past few days they needed to depart in the next few weeks, the people said. They would not be fired, but finding new roles would be a challenge given that many are far along in their careers and opportunities for senior diplomats can
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday announced plans for a national bravery award to recognize civilians and first responders who confronted “the worst of evil” during an anti-Semitic terror attack that left 15 dead and has cast a heavy shadow over the nation’s holiday season. Albanese said he plans to establish a special honors system for those who placed themselves in harm’s way to help during the attack on a beachside Hanukkah celebration, like Ahmed al-Ahmed, a Syrian-Australian Muslim who disarmed one of the assailants before being wounded himself. Sajid Akram, who was killed by police during the Dec. 14 attack, and
RSS